Zvërneci/Rama against the protesters and half-truths and half-rights

2026-06-02 22:09:00, Opinione Lorenc Vangjeli

Edi Rama is fond of frequently mentioning the old axiom that the biggest lies are half-truths. In the game of opinions over facts, half-rights often compete with the same status and bloodlust towards the truth as other half-rights. Moreover, when emotions are fueled in the debate, logic is difficult to hear. In Rama's battle with the protesters, the competition between half-rights, however, is not symmetrical.

Rama is right when he says that a 4 billion euro investment in Zvërnec is a blessing for Albania. But the protesters against him are also right when they say that stories of billions flowing to Albania are as old as the spoons and gold coins of yesterday's communists and the blank checks of today's former democrats.

Rama is right when he mentions the Trump brand as a guarantee of success and not only for the specific investment. Friendship, but also interest with the powerful people of this unjust world, are often worth much more than rivers of money. But his critics are also right when they say that with President Trump's daughter and son-in-law, Rama has set out to buy personal influence for personal power.

Rama is right when he says he has demanded maximum respect for the delicate ecosystem of Zvërnec, but the protesters are also right when they can bring dozens of examples of how exactly the opposite has happened, when the "tiny dot" has turned into an abyss that destroys protected areas, city centers or their suburbs.

Rama is right when he says that the relationship between investors and legal land owners is a private relationship, where the state does not intervene at all, but it is the full right of the protesters to contest such a thing, when they remember the terrible massacre that has occurred for decades in Albania with properties, with the forgeries, the dramas, the installed law of the jungle that has transformed the Albanian coast in particular into a paradise for those who transport cash, at least with vans. That specifically in Vlora, the directors of the cadastre have been changed much more often than the hairs of a wolf and that habit had to happen this time too, for a controversial character to emerge as the owner there too. As if he had been the only grandson of Ali Pasha, former owner of Tepelena, of southern Albania and northern Greece.

Rama is right when he asks not to prejudice a colossal investment, but his opponents are also right when they recall the numerous manholes opened during the government of this country.

There is an endless series of such contrasts that this spontaneous bitter scanner that is being made to Albanian society is generously bringing to light. It is the evidence that shows that the problems created are much more than the solutions brought forward. That the applauded successes shrink in the face of spectacular failures. Depending on the color of the vote and the conviction, the public is free to choose which half-truth it accepts.

Unfortunately, this scanner also shows a much bigger problem. It points to the distorted relationship between the will of the individual who has much more power than the one for whom he was voted and the very system that checks and balances the powers. It is the contradiction between the easy path to decision-making that, for example, the Emir of Qatar has and the difficult path that passes through institutions, debate and compromise of a European head of state.

Precisely for this reason, Rama is in the eye of the cyclone today. The poison gathered in the conscience of citizens who feel unrepresented. excluded, discriminated against, sometimes mocked with jokes and sometimes violently attacked, exposed to solutions with double standards, forced to be polarized, forced to witness lavish luxury while counting their survival money, who feel represented only by the will of a few individuals and who are forced to vote for ridiculous memes to lead them in politics, has brought them together in protest. Albanians are like springs. They endure long, bend and look crushed when you put your foot on them, but the moment your foot gets tired, then they jump uncontrollably. Whoever thinks of them as submissive and without nerves is making the mistake of their lives! Especially since, like everything in the world, "love" for politics and politicians is temporary, changeable, and only a thread separates it from hatred.

And this is only the most visible part of what is happening in these dramatic hours. The resentment of the neighbors for a possible nugget of elite tourism in the former neighbor frustrated by poverty is not just a conspiracy theory. In the event of a change in the balances in the midterm elections in the US, in the Congress and the Senate, Zvërnec and the business connections of the President's daughter and son-in-law will most likely be a battleground between Democrats and Republicans. And small Albania will become a battlefield of unimaginable interests in the country that governs the whole world.

Now Rama only needs time. He needs time to get through at least June because in the scorching Albanian July and August, as a rule without exception, even the hottest passions of Albanians cool down. Until then, he will have plenty of time to think that rats are the first to leave when the ship takes on water. Edi Rama, leader of the socialist majority, knows well that he has filled his ship full of useless, greedy, sly and vain rats, who would be delightful characters at cheerful lunches, but completely incapable of waging battles for political conviction. And above all, until then, Prime Minister Rama will have time to reflect on a frightening and unchanging truth: The big fart is the most serious enemy of silk pajamas! / CNA